Thursday, January 5, 2017

Thanks to Elmer Plasencia's recommendation in the Nordecke Facebook group, began readingThe United States of Soccer: MLS and the Rise of American Soccer Fandomand I would recommend the book. Link.

An early chapter discusses some disastrous team branding Mutiny, Clash, Burn, Wiz and better ones such as D.C. United and

Perhaps the best naming and branding story in the league involved the Columbus Crew. Had Columbus-based fast food chain White Castle had its way, the team would have been named the Slyders after their signature hamburger, and had team organizers gone with their initial inclination, central Ohioans might have rallied behind the Eclipse. Thankfully, the team allowed its pool of potential fans to contribute ideas for team names, and Colombian-born student Luis Orozco was one of thousands of Ohioans who contributed to the naming contest. Orozco was the sole person to come up with the Crew as a name; as he told Eight by Eight magazine, his vision played off Columbus sharing a name with Christopher Columbus, with the “crew” here being the sailors who helped the explorer sail the ocean blue in 1492. Orozco had even conceived a motto in line with the league’s desire to help Americans seek out and find the world’s game at home: “Christopher Columbus discovered America; come and discover us.” On October 17, 1995—the same day as MLS Unveiled—Orozco was announced as the winner of the contest, but the “crew” the team came up with was a far different crew than the one he’d imagined. To his disappointment—and, as it would turn out, the bewilderment and amusement of many—the team adopted a construction crew interpretation of the nickname, culminating in a shield-shaped logo in which “The Crew” topped a rendering of three alleged construction workers in very broad-brimmed hard hats.Even more remarkably, given that a number of teams made wholesale branding changes before the league reached ten years of age, the Crew retained its original logo until October 2014, when the team officially rebranded itself as Columbus Crew SC and replaced the hunky trio with a simple black-and-yellow circular logo made complex by a checkerboard, diagonal lines, and a shield with the number 96 inside it.The only three teams to keep the same name, as well as colors for all 22 seasons are DC United, Columbus Crew SC, and New England Revolution. In New England's casea little too much the same.

The only two not to suck are Columbus Crew and DC United.
Some like the old logo better, link. Haha I won't go that far. Needed an update.

Yet doesn't need to disappear from history, like the Burn or Clash 😁. Is a cool, different thing.

Used like 10-15 times by other fan groups. Is unique.

Yet, while I think the new logo is amazing. I would get rid of the SC in a couple years please. It's god damn annoying.

The new logo would look mint if you just centered the Crew on the bottom.

Plus, everyone calls the Columbus Crew, the Columbus Crew. Not Columbus Crew SC, other than those poor announcers.

If you take the SC out it starts to look a little more pirate/sailor like, as is. Which Orozco would probably approve of most. 🖒🖒

And always yellow and black colored uniforms. Think we all know this now, please.